Job insecurity new norm?

Columnist says American workers have grown passive.

Columnist says American workers have grown passive.

November 14, 2006|ED RONCO Tribune Staff Writer

SOUTH BEND -- The odds you'll be able to hold down a job without getting laid off are getting slimmer and slimmer, and most of you are taking it lying down. The statement and the mild admonishment were given to a room full of University of Notre Dame students on Monday, courtesy of New York Times columnist Lou Uchitelle. Uchitelle has written a book titled "The Disposable America: Layoffs and Their Consequences." He spoke about it as part of the 28th Annual McBride Lecture, sponsored by the Higgins Labor Research Center and the United Steelworkers of America. In his book, Uchitelle argues that layoffs have more than financial consequences for affected workers. "People blame themselves for their own layoffs," he said. "To be told that they don't have value -- which is what a layoff is -- does damage to self-esteem." For every three people who are laid off, one will drop out of the work force entirely and one will get a job somewhere else earning much less than before, Uchitelle said. Only one will earn as much as he or she did prior to the layoff, he said. Job security used to be assumed, Uchitelle told the students. "You people don't even expect it anymore," he said. He cited the national dialogue over automotive company woes. In 1980, when Chrysler was about to go belly-up, the government stepped in with a $1.5 billion bailout, in the form of loans, which the company later repaid. "Part of the debate was, 'Can you let a company like that go under without damaging the country?'æ" Uchitelle said. "Fast forward to today. No debate." Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Corp. both offered major buyouts to scores of workers in the last year, citing an urgent need to downsize in the face of slipping sales. "This is a layoff. This is being thrown out on your ear," Uchitelle said, when asked his opinion on the deals. "It's not a solution -- it's an acquiescence to a bad situation." Uchitelle said we don't question anything anymore. For example, when a company announces a layoff, "we never have a debate over whether the number of layoffs are necessary," he said. And he wondered why students today -- the majority of his audience Monday -- aren't doing more, he said. Why no fight? Why no refusal to acquiesce? "Why aren't you people marching on the campus?" he said. After his lecture concluded, a small gathering of students asked him questions as he signed books in the hallway. One of the students was Mauricio Rojas, a senior studying political science at Notre Dame. Rojas asked whether the climate Uchitelle described -- in which the public seems largely apathetic to the plight of laid-off workers -- was just a product of the current political climate. "You mean the society where people worry about themselves?" Uchitelle said. "We seem to be moving in that direction. I think we should move the other way, to a society where everybody worries about one another." Rojas said he doesn't see that happening. "People are less concerned about changing the system than they are concerned about learning to work the system to their advantage," Rojas said. The Notre Dame student himself might be the exception to that. Rojas said he plans to go into public interest law -- such as education policy -- and work with Teach for America after college. "I don't see myself getting into any market-based work," he said. Staff writer Ed Ronco: eronco@sbtinfo.com (574) 235-6467